


coat our tongues with metal and blood

by ChillinLikeVillains



Category: Prodigal Son (TV 2019)
Genre: Ainsley Whitly is a Good Sister, Blood and Violence, Canonical Character Death, Episode: s01e20 Like Father . . ., Feral Ainsley Whitly, Feral Jessica Whitly, Feral Malcolm Bright, Gen, Malcolm Bright is a Good Brother, Murder, and gil a little bit, someone's throat gets torn out, the entire whitly family goes feral in this one
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-28
Updated: 2020-04-28
Packaged: 2021-03-02 03:15:50
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,695
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23888074
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChillinLikeVillains/pseuds/ChillinLikeVillains
Summary: Nicholas Endicott should have known better. If he hadn't underestimated them, he'd still be alive.But he didn't, and now he wasn't.(AKA four other ways Endicott could have been killed, but wasn't.)
Comments: 3
Kudos: 56





	coat our tongues with metal and blood

**Author's Note:**

> So how about that Prodigal Son season finale?
> 
> Nah, but I hated Endicott so much I imagined him dead in a variety of ways. Here are the four I wrote down.
> 
> Enjoy!

_ forgive me son, for I have sinned. _

When Gil left Malcolm’s loft, it wasn’t his intention to kill Endicott. Truly, it wasn’t.

In all his years as a cop, he never once had a shot that was anything other than clean. Every time, there was imminent harm, an immediate threat, and the department had quickly and easily cleared him every time.

But as he walked away from Malcolm, as he left behind the only person he would ever call his son in the hopes that the little boy who saved his life wouldn’t go down for murder, his grief shifted and changed.

The thought of Jessica alone with that monster turned his foot to lead on the gas, and the darkened streets seemed to fade from his vision as his sole focus became reaching Endicott’s house. He didn’t notice the way the world seemed to drain of color, how the heady grief turned to cold fury in his stomach, how the worry froze in the face of his rage.

No, Gil didn’t notice much of anything. Not then.

On the doorstep on Endicott’s manor he was still undecided, his heart consumed by icy certainty that his mind hesitated to embrace.

Then a man answered the door. A man with a gun at his waist and the sheath of a knife in his jacket, and Gil knew exactly what he had to do.

Two shots. That was all it took.

Two precise, clean head shots and the monster behind the curtain was dead on the floor.

The knife was removed from its sheath and placed in the man’s hand. His gun went into Endicott’s limp palm.

In all his years as a cop, Gil never once had a shot that was anything other than clean. Every time, there was imminent harm, an immediate threat, and the department had quickly and easily cleared him every time.

This time would be no different.

* * *

_ how to kill a king: first, find a queen. _

Panic flared hot and bright as Jessica watched Gil go down, his body shuddering and flinching from the metal being forced into his stomach. Fear made her pull back, rush into the dining room and reach for her phone.

In the milliseconds between her hand reaching for her phone and her actually grabbing it, a single thought crystallized in her mind.

_ He won’t be stopped. _

Nicholas Endicott had just watched as an employee of his stabbed a police lieutenant in the stomach  _ twice  _ in the entrance of his home. He wouldn’t allow that to happen unless he was certain he would get away with it, and with his connection he certainly could.

That thought dumped fuel on the memory of Malcolm’s trapped expression, on Ainsley’s stoic face ruined by eyes that were filled with fear. It lit a match and promptly dropped said match on the kindling that had formed in her stomach at Gil’s choked sound of pain.

Jessica had always known she would do anything for her family. And now she would prove it.

As the door opened, Jessica reached past her phone and instead gripped the pistol she had brought with her.

The sound it made when she fired caused an awful ringing in her ears, but the look on Endicott’s face right as she pulled the trigger would make her smile for a long, long time.

She paused on her way out of the room to put a bullet into his other lung before walking out the door, leaving a writhing Endicott behind, coughing and choking on his own blood.

It was unlikely he would survive, but if he did she would deal with it later.

Gil’s life was more uncertain than Nicholas’ death at the moment, and she knew without a doubt that her body count would grow if it meant Gil would live.

* * *

_ silver spoons and silk sheets cannot satisfy a wolf. _

Malcolm, in one of his darker moments, called himself a dog that his father tried to train to be a wolf.

Wolves and dogs may be of the same family, but domestication has left their DNA so completely and utterly different that one can never become the other. At the time, he had believed Martin to be a wolf, while he was just a mutt that had inherited too much of his all too docile mother.

Now, with Gil in surgery and his life balanced on a knife’s edge, with his mother ready to testify against the monster who framed him for murder, with his sister looking at him with terrified eyes, now Malcolm forgets  _ all of that. _

His heart is thumping like a predator mid-chase, his hands are still and curled into claws, and the red that fills his vision simplifies the world into  _ family-pack  _ and  _ enemy-threat _ and Malcolm  _ strikes _ .

The gun in his bag under the sofa is forgotten, the knives in the drawer just a few feet away are ignored, and as Endicott stands to speak, wary of the glint in Malcolm’s eyes, it becomes oh so simple for Malcolm to lunge and dig his teeth into Endicott’s throat.

The human jaw is capable of exerting incredible force, and were teeth less fragile, less blunt, humans would have a fearsome bite indeed.

Malcolm doesn’t need a wolf’s fangs to do this, though. Flesh is fragile too, and his own blunt teeth part skin easily enough and sink into the flesh and blood below.

It could’ve been seconds, or minutes, or hours. It didn’t really matter to Malcolm. His focus was on the give of flesh beneath his teeth, the hot blood that poured down his chin and into his mouth, the muffled gurgles of his prey.

Eventually, he snapped his jaw shut and pulled his head back in one smooth, violent motion, and something like satisfaction spread through his veins as Endicott collapsed to the floor, one hand pawing at his ravaged throat as he choked and gurgled and bled all over the carpet.

Ainsley stares at the soon-to-be-dead man with something like horrified fascination in her eyes, and she hands Malcolm a handkerchief with a distracted, “Spit it out, you don’t want to upset your stomach” before reaching for a knife from one of the drawers.

As he spits the remains of Endicott’s throat onto the floor and wipes the blood off his face, Ainsley uses a knife to mutilate whatever bite marks Malcolm left behind, and he can tell his sister is already thinking up a story that’s less likely to get him arrested.

The pack looks out for each other no matter what, and as it turns out Malcolm’s family isn’t nearly as domesticated as he thought it was.

* * *

_ fragile, but not like a flower. like a bomb. _

Ainsley was alone. Alone with monsters beyond the flesh and blood one standing in front of her.

The basement held two monsters, shadowy and faded. Monsters made of sharp scalpels and angel statues and chains that bound her brother so tightly he had to mangle himself to escape. She had faced them, watched Malcolm bring them low and beat them at their own game, and they didn’t scare her anymore.

Across the hall was another monster, this one born from echoes and memories. Screams of fear and agony that rippled throughout the house, the sound of a body thrashing and struggling against restraints that were soft and comfortable for a boy who wouldn’t survive any more sharp edges. She had watched the trapped animal that was her brother build a cage for himself, and once she understood that it was to keep him safe from all of the world’s sharpness, it didn’t scare her anymore.

And now there was a new monster here, trying to make a space for himself in the rooms and hallways that still echoed with the sounds of police sirens and night terrors and  _ that wasn’t allowed. _

She waited, not out of indecision or hesitation but because Endicott was Malcolm’s monster too and Malcolm should get to watch as the monster was slain.

For a very long time, people had speculated that Malcolm was his father’s son in every way. That he was a killer, even as a child, and that he spent every moment of his life fighting off some inner voice that was telling him to kill.

They always forgot that the Surgeon had two children.

Malcolm stepped into the room, and as he checked over his sister for injuries he saw the glint of a letter open for just a moment before it disappeared back into her sleeve.

The cold fury in his eyes and the steadiness of his hand was all Ainsley needed to see before she struck.

Once, twice, three times, four . . . it all blended together as she let the monster leashed inside of her mind off of its chain. It was hard work, and her breathing became harsh from the effort it took to force the rather dull piece of metal into Endicott’s torso over and over again. Once or twice she hit bone, and was forced to pull the blade out and seek a blank bit of flesh to pierce.

Then it was done, and Endicott dropped to the floor as Ainsley’s breaths came out in pants, her hand still clutched tight around the letter opener.

Awareness returned in stages. Malcolm gently prying open her hand so he could use a cloth napkin to clean the letter opener’s handle. His voice low and soothing in her ear as he used a fresh napkin to wipe the blood off, first from her face then from his. His eyes gentle as he tilted her face back and forth, ensuring no droplets had been missed.

In a little while she’d have to kick her brain into gear, come up with something to tell the police so their living room looked less like a murder and more like self defense. She’d also have to ask Malcolm what he found out about the true killer whose work Endicott had used to frame him.

But for now, she and her big brother stood side-by-side, looking down at the monster that had tried, and failed, to swallow them all whole.

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you liked it!
> 
> I'm not sure if I'll be posting anymore Prodigal Son stuff, but I have a LOT of ideas, so who knows?


End file.
